A post to the EA Forums from SimCity senior producer Kip Katsarelis explains the measures they are taking to address launch issues with the new SimCity, which include a server hotfix and a version 1.2 patch, but apparently no refunds (contrary to an early statement that said these would be offered). Word is they have temporarily cut off some features to help their servers cope with demand:

Server capacity is our biggest obstacle. We launched in North America on Tuesday and our servers filled up within a matter of hours. What we saw was that players were having such a good time they didn't want to leave the game, which kept our servers packed and made it difficult for new players to join. We added more servers to accommodate the launch in Australia and Japan, and then more yesterday to accommodate the launch in Europe. As of right now, we are adding even more servers which will be going live over the next three days. And, our plan is to continue to bring more servers online until we have enough to meet the demand, increase player capacity and let more people through the gates and into the game.

Earlier today, we released a patch that temporarily cut off some features including leaderboards, achievements and Cheetah Speed to reduce data stress on the servers and effectively free up space so that we can let more people into the game. These are great features that we're proud of and we'll turn them back on soon, but our number one priority is to bring stability to our servers. This update also resolved some of the bugs and issues that have been frustrating players. You can read all about it at http://forum.ea.com/eaforum/posts/list/9341807.page

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MoreLuckThanSkill wrote on Mar 7, 2013, 21:31:Hrm, I had not been paying much attention to this Sim City game... who the hell thought it was such a great idea to have always online?

Also, why the HELL did so many people buy this game if it has always online drm?

On the plus side, sounds like a lot of customers are getting a rough experience with said DRM, hopefully this will help in the long run.

You'd have thought that after Uplay failed miserably at and all the BS with D3 but Simcity has its own crowd I guess. Or at least it did. I smell lawsuits, probably of the class action variety coming down the pipe with all this.

“That's it. You people have stood in my way long enough. I'm going to clown college!”